


I'm right here

by Starkulous



Series: The Last 10 Days Of Irondad & Spiderson [2]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Everyone Has Issues, Gen, Howard Stark's A+ Parenting, Irondad, Nightmares, Parent Tony Stark, Peter Parker Has Nightmares, Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Tony Stark Acting as Peter Parker's Parental Figure, Tony Stark Has Nightmares, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, spiderson
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-17
Updated: 2019-04-17
Packaged: 2020-01-25 21:12:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,163
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18582670
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Starkulous/pseuds/Starkulous
Summary: 'It doesn't matter how smart you are, there are some things you can understand only when you become a parent.'Tony Stark and Peter Parker are superheros. Mental issues are practically a part of the job description.Tony is worried and Peter is scared, and once the other realizes that, Tony Stark finally understands what parenting a super-kid entails.OrPeter and Tony have a fight. Tony dreams that Peter died, and when he check on his kid at 3 am, he finally sees the hurt teenager under the spider mask. If he needs to tell his kid he's never going to be alone, then thats that.





	1. The Fight

**Author's Note:**

  * For [losingmymindtonight](https://archiveofourown.org/users/losingmymindtonight/gifts), [ParkerStark](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ParkerStark/gifts), [possiblyobsessed](https://archiveofourown.org/users/possiblyobsessed/gifts).



> (These amazing writers have amazing IronDad fics!)
> 
>  
> 
> I am BLOWN away by the epic support of my last fic 'Say Cheese!' !!
> 
> I am also new to ao3, so I'm sorry if I don't use the right warnings and tags, but I need to say- PETER IS NOT ACTUALLY GOING TO DIE.

"But Mr. Stark I could've-"  


"You could've DIED, kid."  


"It was not his fault! Besides, I don't think-"  


"An opinion born of flawed judgment is the WRONG opinion."  


"You don't get to-"  


"Yes, I do. Do you know why? Because I'm the adult here, that's why. Gosh, Peter, what were you thinking? We draw thin lines here. I thought we agreed to stick to the ground. I don't get it, you don't want to be an Avenger, you don't want to stick to stopping cycle thefts- you don't want to go to college from the look of last weeks grade sheet-but I suppose your grades can start slipping when you persuade your friend to skip class and hack into a multi-million dollar suit- AGAIN- sneak around my back, lie to your Aunt, and try to stop some sort of drug ring that combined alien tech with heroin to get Oregon high, and didn't bother calling the feds or buying a plane ticket because Mr.Sticky McStick can hang onto a plane till PORTLAND. What do you think would've happened if I didn't get the antidote on the quinjet? The people in Oregon would be drug addicts and you could OD with that shotgun and DIE! This isn't your job. What do I do get that into your head? I made you a high tech suit and you mistreated it. I'd like to take the suit away, but clearly, that's not going to make a difference. If I didn't know any better, I'd think that you have zero respect for me or anything I say or do!"  


"Then you don't know better."  


Tony froze in shock.  


When looked into his kid's doe brown eyes, he saw the kid's hero-worship crumble to dust.  


His usual look of admiration morphed into cold resentment.  


"I hate you" he whispered.

Tony felt his heart shatter into a million pieces.

Peter wordlessly picked his backpack from the couch and walked away.  


Out of the tower.  


Out of his life.  


The last 24 hours were starting to take a toll on him. Although, he knew that even though he wanted to, he couldn't chalk it up to hallucination just yet.Tony felt like laughing at the irony of it all. He should have known. Everyone left him.His parents left him. Jarvis and aunt Peggy left him. His AI left him. The Avengers left him. Now, the kid he saw as his son left him.  


The only one who kept coming back to him was Pepper.  


Tony wished that Peter came back too. But he didn't hold high hopes, not after what was said and done.  


He had a feeling that even Pepper couldn't fix him this time. If only she could fix this.  


Somehow, Peter reminded Tony of Steve. He didn't care if he hurt himself and he definitely didn't care if it was legal. All he cared was about whether it was right.  


Maybe that's why he kept the kid around. To see how long would it take him to make like Steve and leave (He knew that wasn't true).  


Tony Stark hadn't felt like this in years. He didn't feel the sting of betrayal he felt when Steve left him to die in Siberia. He didn't feel the overwhelming grief he felt when he lost his parents. He didn't feel the crushing guilt he felt those few moments he thought Pepper was dead.  


Old memories resurfaced with _these_ emotions.  


He remembered that time decades ago when he was but a little child vying for his father's approval. His father was always so disappointed, and it broke his eight-year-old heart. In his heart, he knew his father always loved him, but he had grown to detest that man for his constant disapproval and harsh remarks.  


He could never forget the last time he would ever see his parents.  


No amount of time, alcohol, or B.A.R.F could ever change what happened on the morning of December 16th, 1991.  


He was home after a hard semester at M.I.T and had woken up to his mother's melodious voice playing 'Try to Remember' on the living room piano. His father strode in with a snide remark and was going to get the bags. He was partially hungover, suffering from a breakup and jetlag and genuinely not in a good mood, as a result, for the first (and last) time in his life, Tony Stark lost it.  


He got into a heated argument with his father and ended up listing every reason why he hated him. For once his father was the one who stopped their fight from escalating by saying they would be late for their meeting with the president.  


While his father got the luggage, his mother explained to him that his father expressed his emotions in a very different way, but that didn't mean he loved him any less. She told him to go apologise to the older man. He didn't.  


Before his parents left for the airport, he saw the slightest flash of hurt in his father's eyes. For a second, he was glad his father knew how he felt all these years.  


For every single day after, he resented himself for that fight. The last thing he told his father was why he hated him. There wasn't a single day that he regretted it.  


Long ago, Tony promised himself to never 'lose it' again. But as of late, he realized he had yelled at the Spider-kid a lot.  


Peter was (literally) ready to tear himself into half to stop the people on the ferry from drowning. The reason he was on the ferry in the first place was because he thought Tony ignored him. Was it really Peter's fault he thought so? Tony didn't tell Peter that he called the feds. He didn't yell at Peter because he managed to hack the suit. He yelled at him because he was worried, not because he was angry. He didn't care about the suit.  


And then what happened today. Some stoned idiots who bought Tooms' tech decided to mix it with drugs. Of course, spider-man came to the rescue and decided to shut them down because they zapped quite a few people with the cocaine gun.  


What probably made it worse was the kid's super hearing.  


Tony felt like a jerk.  


Even as a kid, Tony wasn't particularly open. People who didn't understand that pegged him to be standoffish or stuck-up. He realized that he had gotten too used to the fact everyone around him understood.  


Peter didn't have enough time to understand him.  


He remembered a few Christmases ago, before the accords, before Ultron, the first Christmas the Avengers spent together, He had gotten everyone overly expensive gifts and upgrades. After dinner, Nat pulled him aside for a few minutes while Steve and Clint had an eggnog drinking challenge.  


_"You know Tony," she had said, "I've never come across someone like you."_  


_He cocked his brow, "I'd go for that, but I'm in a committed relationship right now so..."_  


_"Not like that," she took another sip of her drink, "See, everyone who doesn't express their_ _feelings immediately, tries to culminate and justify them in the long term... so for being slightly emotionally detached for the whole year, you try and make it up at Christmas. You wouldn't compliment a person the whole year, but buy them a car at Christmas."_

_He couldn't really argue with that it did sound like something he would do._

_"Interesting observation."_  


_"I'm a spy. It's what I do."_  


Natasha wasn't wrong. Tony was trying to express his affection to Peter with high-end cars and expensive suits, and he had a...different way than most, but now Peter thinks he's mad at him.  


Oh.  


_Oh_.  


Suddenly, he understood all of his Dad's indirect compliments, subtle peace treaties, and refractory affection. That coupled with the fact that he was a busy founder of S.H.I.E.L.D... and everything made sense. For almost forty years, he misinterpreted his father's intentions. A few years ago (when he almost died of palladium poisoning) his father more or less saved his life.  


It was almost laughable. He looked at his father as the greatest person on earth in his childhood, but that changed as he entered his teenage years, although he had to grudgingly admit that Howard Stark was a brilliant scientist and entrepreneur.   


After so many years, he finally understood his father and realized that he spent his formative years fighting someone who didn't think it was a war.  


 Howard Stark was bad at parenting, but he was a good parent.

He tried so hard not to be his father, but in the end, both of them were Starks (Maybe that wasn't so bad at all).  


He had long accepted, that Peter was like his son. He was almost glad he wasn't his biological son because he didn't carry the autistic Stark curse.But somehow, he even managed to screw-up a relationship with someone as pure and understanding as Peter Parker. And he finally left him for good.  


He hurt his parents with pointed words he didn't mean. That was the last thing Tony did to his parents.  


Tony was proud of Peter Parker. He had no right to be, but he couldn't help the feeling of pride that welled in his chest every time his kid got straight 'A's, or successfully rewired Mark 57 on his own, or won AcaDec nationals.  


Tony was worried. Every time he saw Spider-man taking on criminals that he shouldn't have to, or getting stabbed and shot, he was scared. He tried telling the kid to stop, but Peter thought that he felt spiderman wasn't significant enough to fight in the new leagues.  


Tony wanted to tell Peter that, but now it was over. The kid hated him.  


Tony felt exhausted. He didn't realize that he had been crying silently. His head pounded with grief, regret, and guilt. He knew that throwing alcohol into the mix would only make everything worse.  


After many years, Tony Stark felt like the eight-year-old on Christmas who cried to sleep because he had been told by his dad that his gift could be better. He wanted to be tucked in by Jarvis and reassured by his mother that everything was going to be okay.  


But he was a grown man, and as he trudged to his bed in the darkness he realized that he was truly alone. It seemed like an odd sentiment, but it was as if he finally understood the sobriety of his position.  


He knew his mother would never again sing her harmonious Italian lullabies, his father would never again teach him how to solder the mini boards, Jarvis would never gift him another vinyl record, Aunt Peggy would never again bring her sublime lemon tarts and encoraging denamor.   


And it hurt.  


Rhodey couldn't even walk, and it was all his fault. Brue was lost in space, or worse, dead, and that too was his fault. The Avengers were toast because of him. Happy and Pepper got hurt on multiple occasions, he didn't understand why the stuck around for such a long time. He was glad Peter didn't get hurt because of him, but he knew he hurt Peter in his own, horrible, way.  


Tony collapsed under the weight of these thoughts, slipping into a long blissful void.  



	2. Everyone has issues, don't they?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This features Peter's POV, as well as an unfortunate nightmare Tony's brain concorcts. Enjoy!

Peter was angry, hurt, scared and _tired_.  
  


Peter Parker was a fifteen-year-old who's life was turned upside down just because he was at the wrong place at the right time.  
  


Almost a year ago, when he saw Tony Stark casually sitting in his living room, eating his Aunt's horrible cooking, he was surprised, confused, excited and terrified.  
  


When his said idol confronted him about Spider-man, above everything else, a small voice in his head hoped that things would get better.  
  


And yes, Mr. Stark did give him an excellent new suit with his own AI in it, but Peter would admit to being slightly disappointed.  
  


For some reason, he decided that Tony Stark, a genius, billionaire, philanthropist, and Avenger was probably one of the few people on the planet who could understand what living a secret double teenage life, trying to balance school work, activity clubs, friends, romances and overprotective aunts was like.

Turns out, he didn't.

Granted, their lives were exclusively dissimilar and it had probably been stupid to hope in the first place.

For every passing day after Germany, it was getting easier to accept that Team Stark was low on a headcount and spider-man was nothing but a convenient recruit, but that was until the whole homecoming fiasco happened and Tony Stark, the greatest person alive, gave a distinct hint that he had been listening to those stupid messages he left by the tenfold every day.

It was only after the Vulture encounter that Mr.Stark decided he needed a little mentoring if he was ever becoming an asset to the team.  
  


All those Thursdays in the lab, secret visits to Pizzerias under horrible disguises, movie nights at the compound and Ice skating in the Staten Island rink had evolved their relationship into something more than that of your standard Mentor and Mentee. Peter wasn't blind to that.  
  


But he was also tired of being treated like a 5-year old with powers he can't control.If 'baby monitor', 'training wheels' and the 'spider's bedtime' protocols weren't an obvious implication of the kid Mr. Stark thought he was, his unpleasant yelling and unwarranted, incessant worrying were.  
  


Every single time he tried proving to Mr.Stark that he was more proficient than he seemed to think, it didn't settle well with either of them.  
  


He now knew that nobody, not even Mr.Stark could understand how scary stepping up to do the right thing was.  
  


They didn't know that guns and knives made his knees weak, that he woke up in cold sweats in the middle of the night the umpteenth time having dreamt that someone dropped a warehouse on him, or hung him upside down and were seconds away from torturing him.   
  


Tony Stark, on the other hand, was a collected man with a restrained temper who had everything and everyone in the world under control.  
  


Mr. Stark could never understand the walking disaster that Peter was.  
  


All the world ever saw was what he couldn't do correctly, all the mistakes he made and the people he couldn't save. All Mr. Stark saw was how irresponsible he was, if he missed classes or not and if he did something the older man didn't approve of.  
  


So, for once Peter decided to retaliate the way he dealt with his problems, by slapping on the snarky, overconfident spider-man persona he had fabricated to wear on the streets.Peter regretted that.  
  


He wasn't angry, he was furious, at himself.  
  


His mentor would probably demand his suit back, given what he just said to him.  
  


Why couldn't he do anything properly?

* * *

Tony stirred uncomfortably as someone pulled up the blinds of his room and bright sunlight flooded the room.  
  


"Stu'it" he mumbled from under the covers.  
  


"I-I think you need to see this, Tony," Pepper sounded shaken up, which made him sit upright, "W's the matter, M'ss Potts?" he asked drowsily  
  


Pepper silently handed him the Starkpad, wiping tears from her red-rimmed eyes. Tony was confused until he read the article on the tablet.  
  


"No," he said softly.  
  


This wasn't real.

"No, No, No," this had to be a horrible prank.  
  


"It's not real," he whispered to himself.  
  


He felt Pepper's comforting hand on his bare shoulder, "I'm sorry. He was a good kid, Tony" she collapsed beside him, buried her face in her palms and sobbed.  
  


_**Breaking News: Queen's vigilante 'Spider-Man' found dead at 16, confirmed to be a Midtown High student...[Read full article]** _   
  


His eyes thoughtlessly glazed over the words, but his brain couldn't process anything but denial.

'There has to be a mistake, Please, god, Peter...' he thought to himself.  
  


Pepper collected herself, once again wiped her tears, "I've texted you the funeral home address." she silently stifled her sobs and left the room.

A funeral home, it was a place for dead people, Peter was alive. He had to be.  
  


He kept telling himself that it wasn't real. But he decided he needed to see with his own eyes.  
  


Everything that followed was a blur, but he vaguely remembered hastily putting on a suit and heading to the location in the Iron Man armor.   
  


When he arrived, the air around was all but bleak.  
  


Everyone in Queens came to Spider-man's funeral.  
  


Everyone in Midtown high came to Peter Parker's funeral.  
  


He didn't know why he was allowed to come to either.  
  


He felt May tightly gripping his arm and pulling him to a...coffin on the table. An open coffin.  
  


It was going to be empty, right? Peter was building Legos with Ned or doing something stupid and this was all a bad joke, right?  
  


The coffin was all but empty.  
  


There was his kid, lying peacefully in a box, he was sleeping.  
  


But he was too pale and blue to be sleeping. He looked so... dead.  
  


And then it hit him like a ton of bricks.  
  


Peter Parker was dead.  
  


_Dead_.  
  


He was _never_ coming back.  
  


Never again will he excitedly blabber about nanotechnology or random star wars trivia. Never again will he show him his report card and tinker with him in the lab. He will never get to mess with his kid's hair and tease him about crushes.  
  


And god, the last thing they did was fight.  
  


_Just like his parents._   
  


He was a failure. He failed the kid who looks... _looked_ up to him.  
  


His kid was _gone_.  
  


Tony Stark had been through a lot.  
  


But nothing could compare to this.  
  


It felt like his entire world had been snatched away.   
  


It felt like someone ripped his heart out and he died but a shell of the person he was still walked the earth.  
  


It felt like his tears dried up and he couldn't cry.  
  


It felt like everything lost its color.  
  


He looked at Peter again. Every happy memory they shared now became a sad one. Even his usually flustered cheeks looked a washed out white. His cheekbones were excessively prominent. His lips were a pale blue instead of lively dark pink.  
  


He knew all he was capable of feeling his moment forth was regret, guilt, and loneliness.Peter's still face pushed him over into the pit of despair.  
  


Everything was silent, nothing mattered anymore and Tony felt he would be falling for eternity. Peter's motionless form would forever haunt him.  
  


The only thing about Peter that was still the same was his hair. They had lost some of their shine, but his uncontrollable messy curls still stuck out everywhere making him look even more of a child.  
  


Tony couldn't bear to see him like this, but he felt compelled to tuck a stray lock of his slovenly hair behind his ear.  
  


As he reached out to the boy's corpse, his hand was caught in a vice, death-like grip.  
  


It was Peter, holding his wrist.  
  


He couldn't believe it. His kid still didn't look like himself, but rather a more sterile, somber and zombie-like version of himself.  
  


He wanted to apologize. He wanted to hug his kid, he-  
  


"Why didn't you do more?" Peter whispered.  
  


He sat up straight in his coffin, his complete demeanor screamed death.  
  


"This is all your fault!" he hollered, "I hate you."  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I based his experience off a nightmare I had irl. I cannot imagine how painful it must be to actually lose someone you love.
> 
> For everyone who has ever gone through a similar experience, I am truely sorry.


	3. I'm not going anywhere

He bolted upright in panic. He could hear his heartbeat ringing in his ear.

He was covered in sweat, emotionally distraught, but he felt relief flooding the course of his veins.

_It wasn't real._

He was never this grateful to wake up in the middle of the night halfway to an anxiety attack.

Tony looked at the alarm clock, which read 2:39 am in annoying bright red letters.

Through experience, he knew well enough that he wasn't going to sleep anymore tonight.

He couldn't shake off the unpleasant feeling that his world had been ripped apart, even half an hour after he woke up.

He kept reminding himself that Pepper was in D.C, and his spider-kid was tucked in his bed. 

But the sentiment wasn't reassuring enough. Tony decided that he wasn't going to be able to sleep ever again if he didn't get to see his Spider-baby's alive and colorful face one last time. Sure, he had messed up and at this point, if the kid didn't want him a mile near his house it was understandable, and creeping outside his window at three in the morning wasn't going to make anything better.

But, he was also frantically trying to flush out the images of Peter lying in a coffin with an ashen grey appeal that his nightmare so graciously provided him with.

He walked up to the top floor faster than ever and waited as his armor formed around him before he shot across the sky making the three-hour journey in a matter of minutes.

He finally reached the familiar apartment in Queens, where the kid he was so fond of grew up and stayed.He let his armor dissemble around the fire escape outside Peter's window and gently lifted the pane as the kid had told him he often left it open after patrols.

Tony carefully pushed the curtains and peeked into the room.

There he lay, sleeping contently as his arms and legs sprawled across the lower half of the bunker bed.

His room smelt like fresh pine and old paper, the floor was covered in Lego pieces, old homework sheets and two empty boxes of pizzas. The walls and closet doors were covered Star Wars, Back to the future, or Avengers posters. On his desk was a lamp, used high school textbooks, the StarkBOOK air he gave the kid for his birthday and a box of soldering wires. Half of the spider-man suit was peeking out of his closet's lower half.

In short, the room hadn't changed a lot since Tony first came here a year ago.

He looked at the sleeping kid again.

The moonlight falling through the window made the kid look a bit whiter than usual. Tony didn't like that very much. His dream had been vivid and unnerving, and he had been trying his best to forget it.

But his fears were consoled, Peter was far from the still and lifeless form he had taken in the nightmare. He was having small spasms and jerked suddenly and violently in his sleep.

"Help! II-I'm sorry! Let me go...Stop! Keep the lastic away!" he vigorously thrashed around.Tony, having years of experience in this particular field immediately knew that his kid was having a nightmare.

He didn't think twice; he entered through the window, tenderly brushed his hair in repetitive motions and whispered comforting words to his kid.

'Lastic?' Tony remembered the drug guy who was going to torture Peter minutes before he arrived called the gun 'lastic'. Peter was having nightmares about Portland.

"It's going to be okay, Peter. It's just a bad dream, you're not in Portland...that's it". 

The ruse worked for a while, the boy had considerably calmed down.

  
Tony felt like an idiot.

He was worried about the kid, and he ended up yelling at him and he was glad Peter wasn't harmed. At least not physically.

He overlooked the kid behind the mask, a sixteen-year-old who was struggling with the profession. As his mentor, it was his job to make sure Peter was fine. He looked fine, but he wasn't. And Tony made it worse.

Peter was a brave, young superhero. It must have been frightful to cling to a plane for hours and fight for justice in another state.

Tony realized, even though someone like Steve would be more equipped to handle his kid, he couldn't just quit being his mentor. He had nightmares. He needed help.

So far he had done a crappy job, but Tony vowed from here onwards he would do everything in his power to make sure the kid was alright.

Like right now.

Although in a matter of minutes, Peter's eyes fluttered open and he was visibly in distress, but oddly he wasn't in the least alarmed to find Tony Stark sitting on his bed.

He hysterically wrapped his arms around his mentor and choked panic sobs, "I'm sorry, I thought you left. I'm sorry Mister Stark, I didn't mean anything I said yesterday. I-I'm scared"Tony was surprised at the natural sentiment, but he was glad the kid was giving him another chance. He was going to make it count.

"I'm sorry too, kid. I messed up" he could feel his eyes getting moist, "You're the bravest kid I know. And I'm not going anywhere, I'll always be right here."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And day two of 'The last 10 days of Irondad' is a wrap! Tune in tomorrow for the socia media fic!

**Author's Note:**

> How was it? Anything that could be better? I love hearing from all of you!!! :')
> 
> Let me know if anyone would be interested in a spotify playlist for the series.


End file.
